News & Insights

United States Global Leadership Campaign at the Ronald Reagan International Conference Center

Address presented by President George W. Bush

10:00 AM First Lady Laura Bush is introduced to speak on behalf of her current efforts in Africa. She is traveling to four African countries next week to reaffirm PEPFAR goals and visit schools under the African Education Initiative (AEI).

10:10 AM President George W. Bush is introduced by the First Lady. Begins by announcing his presence at next week’s G8 summit in Germany. He wishes to address “the common responsibility to improve lives.” The President reiterated that helping struggling nations is in “our best interest” because they translate into new jobs at home. If we are to help struggling nations by opening up trade, this will likely decrease the “export of terror.”

The President discussed at length pertinent trade issues. He began by stating, “Trade is the best way to improve countries and the lives of their people.” Increased access to trade relieves the burden of debt on developing nations. Using a recent trip to Guatemala as an example, Bush affirmed open markets for local entrepreneurs not only benefit the nation in question but the United States as well. Citing DR-CAFTA, he concurred that as a result of this FTA, Latin American countries are now able to grow high value crops because of new markets created by these US backed FTAs.

President Bush also addressed the recent Peru-Columbia-South Korea FTA negotiations saying that free trade is the best way to lift people out of poverty. He followed with, “If you’re interested in helping poor people, you should be interested in trade.”

He reminded the audience that he supported the multilateral FTI two years ago at Gleneagles (Education FTI and Global Fund FTI). President Bush also prided his administration on the fact that they canceled $3.4 billion worth of debt owned by five countries.

He encouraged Congress to re approve spending budgets in Africa by 2010 so the US can “get the job done” and “be the leader at the G8.” He announced a new FTI, which he recently created: the Africa Financial Sector Initiative that will create new private equity funds for African entrepreneurs.

Bush then reaffirmed his efforts in the past two years concerning education, disease, and infrastructure initiatives in Africa. He covered his efforts concerning PEPFAR, the Millennium Challenge Account, and the AEI. He also touched upon US initiatives regarding global warming and green house gas emissions.

10:45 AM President Bush concluded his speech.